


fresh starts

by LemongrassAndSleep



Category: The West Wing
Genre: F/M, First Bartlet Campaign, bartlet for america, margaret hooper is a lesbian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:21:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25918012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LemongrassAndSleep/pseuds/LemongrassAndSleep
Summary: When Donna Moss packed up her belongings and drove from Wisconsin to New Hampshire to join the Bartlet for America campaign, the last thing she was expecting was to make lifelong friendships. But how did those friendships start out?
Relationships: Josh Lyman/Donna Moss
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	fresh starts

The first person Donna met after Josh was Margaret. It was later on that same day, and Josh had asked her to get Margaret to assign a volunteer to him for some research he needed done. Donna had to admit she was slightly nervous to face Margaret as she knew she had essentially conned her way into working with Josh. _It’s fine,_ she thought to herself, _I’m_ _sure she can’t keep track of_ every _volunteer in this place. She probably won’t even realise she didn’t assign me to anyone._

“Hey, Margaret, right? Josh needs-”

“Who are you?” Margaret cut her off and looked at Donna with confusion, trying - and obviously failing - to remember assigning her to a member of staff. Donna could sense that Margaret knew something wasn’t quite right, and started to panic.

“I’m Donna, I work for Josh.” She grabbed the lanyard Josh had given her hours earlier, and waved it about awkwardly, desperately hoping she wasn’t about to get thrown out the building.

“I don’t remember assigning you to Josh. I’ve never seen you before in my life.” Margaret was confused now. Donna laughed, partly out of fear and partly out of more awkwardness.

“It’s a funny story actually, um, you didn’t actually assign me to Josh. If anything, I assigned myself to him.” She was getting flustered now, and all she wanted was for Margaret to drop it. Margaret just stared straight at her, waiting for her to finish her ‘story’. “That’s it. That’s, uh, that’s the story.”

“You’re not allowed to do that.”

“Um, yeah, sorry. Josh is okay with it though, he gave me this,” Donna said, clutching onto the lanyard for dear life. 

“Hm, okay. Don’t do it again,” Margaret said, returning to her work.

“Oh. Right okay, well, um, Josh needs someone to write a research memo for him.”

“I’ll send someone over,” Margaret said without looking up. Donna nodded and turned to leave the office (if you can call it that) Margaret was working in. Just as she reached the door Margaret spoke. “Me and some other assistants are going out in South Carolina tomorrow night, if you want to join us.”

Donna spun around, grinning from ear to ear. “Really? I’d love to. Where are you guys going?”

“We’re probably just going to find a bar somewhere.”

“Great, thanks, Margaret.” Donna lingered near the door, thinking Margaret was going to say something else.

“I’ll send Josh a volunteer in a bit,” Margaret said, trying to indicate to Donna that their interaction was over.

“Oh, right, yeah,” Donna said, and hurried out the door.

When she finally found her way back to Josh’s office, he was frantically running around, trying to find the piece of paper he left on his desk.

“What took you so long? I can’t find this memo,” Josh finally looked up at her. “What are you smiling about?”

“It’s right in front of you. No- a bit to the left. There.” she laughed at him. “You need to tidy that desk up. No wonder you can’t find anything, there’s about half a dozen coffee cups all over it.”

“Isn’t that your job? I thought you were my assistant now,” Josh smirked at her.

“I’ll get right on that. I’m assuming there’s a bin somewhere under that pile of rubbish in the corner?” Donna joked, moving towards the desk and collecting all the pieces of obvious rubbish she could find. She’d sort through the bits of paper lying around after.

“Are you sure you want to sass me right now? I just gave you a job.”

“And I am very, very grateful,” she said, hiding her face from him so he wouldn’t see her smile.

“Too right. Plane leaves in two hours. Don’t miss it.”

The next night, Donna met Bonnie and Ginger. They were already on their second drink when she and Margaret joined them and they were comparing ex-boyfriends when Donna and Margaret slid into the booth.

“You want to talk about bad exes? I had an ex-girlfriend cut holes in all my clothes once after I broke up with her. We’d only been seeing each other for a month!” Margaret shouted over the loud music, sliding into the conversation with ease.

“How do you always manage to find the most unhinged women? Didn’t one of your exes show up at an uncles’ funeral like, a year after you ended things?” Bonnie laughed.

“What can I say? It’s hard for some to let a girl like me go,” Margaret laughed with her. “Bonnie, Ginger, this is Donna Moss. She’s Josh’s new assistant. Donna, this is Bonnie and Ginger.”

“Hey Donna,” Ginger said, taking a sip of her drink. “Good luck with Josh.”

“He hasn’t been _that_ bad,” Donna said, strangely defensive of the man she met only yesterday. “Although, I have only been working for him for about thirty hours,” she added with a smile.

“Where are you from, Donna?” Bonnie asked.

“Minnesota, originally, but I was raised in Wisconsin.”

“How’d you end up in South Carolina?” Ginger said.

“I just needed a change. Bad ex-boyfriend and all that. I had to get out of there so I packed up and drove to New Hampshire,” Donna said, choosing not to go into details right now. She didn’t need the whole Bartlet for America campaign to know what a doormat she could be.

“Well, here’s to fresh starts,” Margaret said, raising her drink.

“To fresh starts!” Bonnie, Ginger, and Donna said in unison. Maybe it was the warm buzz of the alcohol making its way through her veins, but Donna couldn’t help but feel all fuzzy inside. Maybe coming here wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

Donna ran into CJ the next day on the way into work. Quite literally ran into her. She hadn’t slept well the night before (the bed she’d slept in, in the cheapest room she could find, had springs coming out the mattress, and everytime she moved the bed frame groaned like it was about to collapse) and she’d stayed in the bar late talking to Margaret, Bonnie, and Ginger. On top of that, she was dreading the phone call she was planning to make to her mum later. Donna hadn’t exactly told her about her plans to drive to New Hampshire and get a job with a presidential campaign. In fact, as far as her mum was concerned, she was in her bed in the tiny flat she was renting with her boyfriend, not South Carolina. To be fair, her mum wasn’t exactly her ex’s biggest fan, so maybe the conversation wasn’t going to be as disastrous as she was expecting.

She’d decided to get Josh a coffee on the way in, as a tiny gesture of her appreciation of the faith he had placed in her the previous day. In fact, now she was thinking about it, maybe it was _too_ tiny. Shit, now she was second guessing her plan. As Donna was deciding whether or not to just dump the coffee in the nearest trash can, she walked right into a woman who was talking on the phone, knocking the drink all over the only blouse she had with her. 

“Shit!” Donna said, unsure what to do with herself now she had a whole cup of coffee on her top and skirt.

“Sorry dad, I need to call you back.” Donna heard the woman say into the phone before hanging up and turning to face her. “You okay?” She said, with a look of concern Donna had only seen before on her mother.

“I think so. Lucky for me I got lost on the way over here so the coffee wasn’t hot anymore.”

“Do you work for the campaign?”

“As of yesterday, yeah. Although I’m not sure how much longer I’ll have a job if I show up wearing a coffee stained blouse.” Donna shook her head and laughed to herself. Of course _she_ would do something like this. “I’m sorry, I’m Donna Moss.”

“CJ Cregg,” the woman said, reaching out to shake Donna’s hand.

“CJ Cregg? Didn’t you work with EMILY’s List?” Donna said, shaking her hand. “I really admire what they’re doing.” CJ almost blushed.

“Yeah, I did. I was proud of that work,” CJ said, almost wistfully (in truth, CJ was struggling to be taken seriously at the campaign, and was beginning to have second thoughts about working with Bartlet for America). She smiled at Donna. “Come with me, I’m sure we can find someone who works for us with a spare shirt in your size.”

“Thank you so much, CJ. I think getting fired after one day would have to be some kind of record,” Donna said as CJ led her through the South Carolina headquarters and into her tiny office.

“Is it true you hired yourself? I remember Josh telling us about you last night, now,” CJ said as she put her stuff down on her desk.

“Ha, yes, it is. I have to say I can’t believe it worked. He didn’t- He didn’t tell you why I left Wisconsin, did he?” Donna said, already flushing red at the thought of more members of the senior staff knowing she was ready to give up her future to support her good-for-nothing boyfriend.

“He didn’t say anything about Wisconsin. I assumed you were local. Hang on a minute, you came from _Wisconsin_? Damn. That’s a commitment. Okay, stay here, I’ll go ask around about a shirt for you.”

CJ returned after about twenty minutes having found a shirt that was slightly too big for Donna from a volunteer, however, it was better than nothing. “Here,” she said, handing the shirt to Donna and leaving her office so Donna could change in private. 

“I can’t even begin to thank you enough CJ,” Donna said before CJ went. She was so overwhelmed by everything she was a bit worried she was going to burst into tears in her office.

“It’s no problem. If you ever need anything, all you have to do is ask,” CJ smiled. “Also, good luck with Josh. He can be a bit of a handful.”

Josh mostly had Donna answering calls and running around places for him over the next few days, so she didn’t meet anyone new until the end of the week. She went out with the other assistants a few nights, but only ordered tap water, as she needed to save what little money she’d gotten from selling her car at the nearest second-hand dealership she could find in New Hampshire, and the plane ticket had taken a large chunk of that. If she wasn’t careful, she’d have to ask CJ or Margaret if she could sleep on one of their hotel room floors, and she was pretty sure they weren’t quite there yet.

She knocked on the door of one of the speechwriters for the campaign, and heard someone invite her inside. Once Donna was inside, she realised the man was on the phone so she stood quietly in the doorway and waited for him to finish.

“...anyway Lisa, please, just call me,” he said with a sigh, carefully placing the phone back in its place on the holder.

“Sam Seaborn, right? Josh needs to see you about this speech-”

“That was my fiance- my ex-fiance. She broke up with me last night. Cause of the campaign.” Sam slumped down into his chair, dropping his head into his hands.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Donna said, forgetting about whatever Josh had sent her over for. “She a republican?” she cracked, earning herself a small laugh from Sam. She smiled to herself, proud for cheering this guy up even a little.

“No. Just, you know, fed up of me never being there for her.”

Donna dropped the files she was carrying on Sam’s desk and moved round his side to put a comforting hand on his back. “I’m sure that wasn’t always the case,” she tried.

“No, it was,” Sam said, finally looking up at Donna. “You probably don’t care. I’m sorry, We don’t know each other. I don’t even know your name.”

“I do, and don’t worry about it. I’m Donna,” she smiled and put her hand out for him to shake. 

“Oh, nice to finally meet you Donna. Josh told me about you,” Sam said, taking it.

“Should I be worried?” Donna said, nervous about what he could have heard. Although, Josh didn’t tell CJ about ‘Dr Freeride’, so she supposed he probably wouldn’t have told Sam.

“Not at all. He loves having you work for him.”

“Oh, okay. First I’m hearing of this,” Donna said, flushing bright red. She noticed Sam’s smile falter and a look of sadness flash across his face. “You going to be alright?”

“Probably. Do me a favour and don’t say anything to Josh. I haven’t told him yet.”

“Nobody will hear a word from me, promise.”

“Thank you.” Sam got out of his seat, and Donna noticed the heaviness he seemed to carry with him as he moved.

“You need a hug?” Donna offered, and when Sam nodded she wrapped her arms around this man she’d known for five minutes. “If you don’t want to see Josh right now I can hold him off for a couple of hours.”

“Would you mind?”

“Not at all,” Donna said, gathering up the files she’d dumped on Sam’s desk. “I’ll tell him you’ll come to his office at the end of the day.”

“Thanks again Donna. I like you already,” Sam said, smiling at her.

Donna beamed back at him. “I like you already too.”

“Donna!” Josh shouted from his desk, without realising she was already standing in his doorway.

“There’s no need to shout, I’m right here,” she said, sitting down on the chair opposite him. In a week of working for him, she’d started to get used to the absolute whirlwind Josh Lyman could be, and instead of being overwhelmed by it, she’d settled into quietly cleaning up the mess he’d leave in his wake, occasionally joking around with him while she did it. “What do you need?”

“Sorry, I didn’t see you. Can you order me some food?” 

“Sure, what do you want?”

“Um, just a burger or something,” Josh said, focused on the polling numbers in front of him.

“Burnt within an inch of its life, I assume?” Donna joked, trying to lighten the tone.

“Yeah,” he said, dismissively. “See if Toby wants anything. I need to go over this with him and he gets all… grumpy when he’s hungry.”

“Do you mean hangry?” Donna offered, still trying to get him to engage with her and not whatever had put him in _this_ mood.

“What?”

“Hangry? Angry and hungry?” Donna wasn’t _quite_ tuned in to Josh’s needs yet, (although she was getting there) and right now what Josh needed was to be left to stew.

“Yeah, whatever. Ask Toby if he wants anything and get him over here.”

Donna left Josh’s office feeling slightly dejected, and as she made her way to the office of the communications director it occurred to her that she hadn’t actually met Toby Ziegler yet. She’d seen him around, of course, but they hadn’t been introduced to each other or even spoken in passing.

She knocked on his door and heard a grunt from the other side, which she took as an invitation to enter.

“Mr Ziegler? Josh sent me to ask for your lunch order.” She held a pencil in one hand and a little notebook in the other, a callback from her waitressing days. Thinking about it, she felt a little silly. What if Toby thought she was too stupid to remember the order?

“I’ll have a sandwich.”

“Any sandwich in particular?” Donna pushed, trying to get more information out of this man who was clearly of little words. She was struggling to believe this was he who wrote the main body of Governor Bartlet’s incredible speeches.

“Roast beef.” Well. She definitely didn’t have to write that down. Donna shoved the notepad and pencil under her arm in a pathetic attempt to try and hide them.

“Okay, um, Josh wants to see you about something,” Donna said, making her exit.

“What?”

“Excuse me?” Donna said, turning around, as she hadn’t quite heard what he’d said. She had to admit, she was a little afraid of him. She’d seen him lose his patience with volunteers more than once.

“What does he want to see me about?” Toby over enunciated every syllable, like Donna was stupid. She felt her eyes well up with tears, and she did her best to blink them away. The last thing she needed was to cry in front of him. On top of it being mortifying, Donna doubted he’d give her any sympathy.

“Oh, I think it’s polling numbers,” Donna said, her voice cracking. If Toby noticed, he certainly didn’t care.

“You _think_?” Toby looked up at Donna for the first time, and she stood there frozen, not knowing what to do. He sighed to himself. “Okay, tell him I’ll be there in a minute.”

Donna nodded and ran to the bathroom to compose herself before going to the diner near the South Carolina headquarters to get the food Josh and Toby had asked for. On the way back, she ran into CJ, who noticed she was still visibly shaken up.

“Donna! Is something wrong?”

Donna didn’t want CJ to think she couldn’t handle the pressure of a presidential campaign, in case she told Josh, and then Josh fired her, so she quickly wiped at her watery eyes and tried to sound cheery. “Yeah! I’m fine! Why?”

“You’re a terrible liar Donna, what’s wrong?” CJ wasn’t about to let this go.

“Josh asked me to talk to Toby-” Clearly, that was all the information CJ needed.

“Fucks sake. I’m going to kill him. He needs to stop making staffers cry! You’re the sixth one this week,” CJ shouted, and Donna begged her to lower her voice. “I’m sorry. Look, meet me after work, we’re going to the bar. You look like you need some fun.”

“Thanks CJ.” She felt slightly better already. “I need to get this to Josh,” she said, gesturing to the brown paper bag in her hand.

Josh kept Donna pretty busy for the rest of the day, so she didn’t see anyone until she arrived at the bar with CJ. She hugged Sam, and quietly asked how he was coping. She was glad to hear that he was doing better despite Lisa not returning any of his calls. He then bought her a drink, despite her protests, and she was chatting with him and CJ when Toby came back from the bathroom. Once Donna noticed him, she immediately straightened up in her seat (she wasn’t entirely sure why), but expected him to ignore her, feeling that she was fairly insignificant to him. She was surprised, then, when he walked straight towards her.

“Donna,” Toby said, looking down at the floor to avoid eye contact.

“Um, yes?” she could hardly believe he was talking to her.

“I heard that you were upset, after we spoke this afternoon,” Toby trailed off before CJ gave him a glare, forcing him to continue.”‘I’m sorry I was being rude.”

“Oh,” Donna said, shocked. “It’s okay. Thank you for apologising.”

“It won’t happen again,” he said, before sitting down next to CJ, who had a satisfied smile on her face.

“Why don’t you buy me a drink to make up for it?” Donna grinned at him and Toby smiled back at her. Sam and CJ laughed.

“Okay,” Toby agreed. Sure enough, although he didn’t stop terrorising the rest of the junior staffers, he wasn’t rude to Donna again.

It was almost a month later when Donna met Leo McGarry. She was sitting in comfortable silence with Josh in his office (as had become a habit), her on the floor organising his files and him sat at his desk reading a memo Toby had handed him earlier, when he suddenly spoke. 

“Before I forget, Leo wants you to go see him at the end of the day.”

“Leo… McGarry?” Donna frowned, wondering why on earth the Bartlet campaign manager wanted to see her. Her heart sped up as she immediately jumped to the conclusion that she was about to be fired.

“Is there another Leo working for the campaign?” Josh said, as he wrote some notes in the margin of whatever he was reading.

“Why does Leo McGarry want to see me?” Donna was panicking now. She couldn’t get kicked off the campaign. The thought of going back to her parents in Wisconsin made her flush red with embarrassment. 

“How should I know?” Josh told a tiny white lie. He’d spoken to Leo a few days ago about getting Donna on the payroll and he was hoping that’s what Leo wanted to see her about, but Josh knew how much she wanted this and didn’t want to get her hopes up in case he was wrong.

“Is he going to fire me?” Donna said, quietly. There was a lump in the back of her throat and she blinked furiously to stop any tears forming in her eyes. Josh heard the wobble in her voice and looked over at her sitting on the floor, eyes damp.

“No, why would he fire you? Donna, what’s wrong?” Josh was confused as to why she’d suddenly become so upset, but he got up from his chair and sat down next to her, shoving some binders out of the way as he did so.

“I like working for you, Josh, I don’t want to have to go back home,” Donna said, her shoulders slumped over. Josh wasn’t entirely sure what to do, so he put one arm around her and hoped she wouldn’t find it inappropriate. To Donna’s surprise, she started to feel better almost immediately.

“You’re not going to get fired. I don’t know what Leo wants but I’m the only one who would have given him a reason to fire you and I can promise you I didn’t. Alright?” Donna nodded and sniffed, taking a few deep breaths to compose herself. Josh pulled his arms back off of her and stood up, using his hands to try and remove some of the dirt from the floor of his trousers. “I’ll buy you a drink once you’re done with Leo, ‘kay?”

“Sounds good.”

A few hours later, Donna found herself at the door to Leo’s office. She took a second to smooth down her skirt and comb her fingers through her hair to get rid of any obvious knots before knocking.

“Come in,” Donna heard Leo say from the other side of the door, and she noticed her palms were slightly damp as she twisted the doorknob.

“You wanted to see me, Mr McGarry?” she stood in the doorway, too nervous to go any further.

“Call me Leo. Donnatella Moss, right?” Leo said, motioning for Donna to sit at the chair facing him. Donna hurried towards the chair and sat down before she spoke again.

“That’s me. You can just call me Donna though” she said, fiddling with her hands in her lap.

“Okay Donna,” Leo smiled warmly, trying to put her at ease. “How long have you been working for Josh?”

“Um, coming up on five weeks now, I think.” Donna watched as Leo wrote something down on a sheet of paper in front of him, and she felt her heart rate skyrocket for the second time that day.

“Josh tells me you hired yourself,” Leo smirked. Donna was so anxious she didn’t hear the amusement in his voice.

“I really am very sorry-”

“Don’t worry about it. Josh has been on time to more meetings since you showed up than he ever has in his entire life.” Donna relaxed at that. Maybe Leo hadn’t called her here to tell her off after all. “Josh also tells me you aren’t getting paid.”

“No Sir- Mr McGarry- Leo.”

“You paid for the plane ticket here yourself?”

“I sold my car,” Donna explained.

“Well Donna, I think it’s about time we paid you for your contributions to the campaign. Oh, and got you a proper hotel room,” Leo said, smiling at her. Donna grinned back at him.

“Thank you, Mr- Leo. Thank you Leo. You won’t regret it.”

“You’re a good kid, Donna. We’re glad to have you.”

Josh was delighted when Donna told him the news. In truth, Donna had become so valuable to him in the five weeks she’d been his assistant, he wasn’t sure what he’d do if she suddenly decided the work wasn’t worth no pay anymore. He pulled Donna into another hug, and then he got an idea.

“Hey, have you met the Governor yet?”

“Governor Bartlet? No,” Donna said, shaking her head.

“Come with me,” Josh said, taking her by the hand and leading her down the corridor to Jed Bartlet’s office. Had it been any other time, Donna would have been freaking out, but she’d just been given a salary for the first job she’d ever had that she enjoyed and although she didn’t want to admit it, the feeling of Josh’s hand in hers was making her a little lightheaded. 

Josh knocked on the Governor’s door and in the second it took to get a reply, he realised he was still holding Donna’s hand. He detangled himself from her before opening the door.

“Governor? I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” Josh said, carefully stepping inside.

“Nothing important,” Jed said, taking his glasses off and tossing them onto the table. “Can I help you with anything, Josh?” 

“I just wanted you to meet my new assistant, Donna Moss. She’s been a great help to me and she’s been incredibly valuable to the campaign.” 

Donna stepped out from behind Josh, like a shy child. “It’s nice to meet you, sir.”

“Ah, you’re the one who’s been keeping Josh organised. I tell you what, I’ve never known a man so accomplished to be so incapable of keeping track of his possessions. How he made it to where he is to today while wasting all that time running back and forth places trying to find random pieces of paper I’ll never know.”

“It’s a mystery to all of us, sir,” Josh said, looking at the carpet to hide the flush of embarrassment rising in his cheeks while Donna laughed. At that moment, a short, older woman walked in with something for the Governor to sign.

“Ah, Mrs Landingham, this is Donna Moss, Josh’s new assistant.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Ms Moss,” the woman said, crossing the room to shake Donna’s hand. “I hope Josh is treating you well.”

“He is, ma’am. He’s just about to buy me a drink, actually,” Donna said, grinning at Josh.

“I am, so we’d better get going. Thank you for your time, sir,” Josh said to Governor Bartlet, who was signing the piece of paper.

“No problem at all, it was lovely meeting you Donna, thank you for your help with the campaign.”

“It’s been a pleasure sir,” Donna said, before Josh led her out of the room.

Donna arrived with Josh at the bar to find that all her new friends from the campaign were already there. Toby and CJ were arguing in the corner, and Margaret was talking to a woman Donna didn’t recognise at the bar while Sam, Bonnie, and Ginger played at the pool table. CJ stopped arguing with Toby when she saw Donna come in and ran over to give her a hug.

“Congratulations Donna!” 

“Josh told you?” Donna said, as everyone else began descending on her to give her more hugs.

“Of course.”

“Hey, you get to sleep in a structurally sound bed now,” Sam joked, pulling her close to him.

“That sounds nice.” She hadn’t had a good night’s sleep since arriving in South Carolina and she was pretty sure it was starting to show in the bags around her eyes. 

Josh pressed a drink into her hands and she flashed him a smile by way of saying thank you. He raised his own glass in the air. “To Donna, the best assistant I’ve ever had.”

“I’m the only assistant you’ve ever had, Josh,” Donna laughed, but raised her glass nonetheless.

“To Donna,” everyone said, voices raised over the (terrible) loud music coming from the speaker on the wall. Donna smiled to herself as she took a mouthful of her drink. She was happier than she could remember being since she dropped out of college eight months ago. She’d found her purpose, and she’d found people who cared about her, far more than her ex ever had. She’d been right when she’d begged Josh to hire her in the New Hampshire office all those weeks ago. She was good at this.

“You’d better not keep Donna all for yourself. She’s too smart to be kept in your office for the rest of her working life,” CJ cautioned Josh. They both watched Donna as Margaret, Bonnie, and Ginger pulled her in for a group hug. Josh couldn’t help but notice the way his heart squeezed in his chest whenever her face lit up with that smile of hers.

“I know.”

**Author's Note:**

> hope you enjoyed!! i really wish tww had explored more of Donna's character outside of her relationship with Josh (Aaron Sorkin hates women wbk) and i also wish we'd seen more of how everyone's friendships started out so i decided to write it myself :)


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